Ink jet printers operate by ejecting small droplets of liquid ink through a nozzle onto print media according to a predetermined pattern. In some implementations, the ink is ejected directly on a final print media, such as paper. In other implementations, the ink is ejected on an intermediate print media, e.g. a print drum, and is then transferred from the intermediate print media to the final print media.
On occasion, the nozzles of ink jet printers can become obstructed, blocked, or otherwise develop non-uniformities such that the droplets are ejected with an undesirable size, speed, trajectory, and/or are not ejected at all. Current droplet monitoring techniques use machine vision with strobed video or high speed camera. These techniques are expensive, time consuming, and can require extensive software development.